Los Angeles
County
Biographies
WILLIAM WARREN ORCUTT
William Warren Orcutt, vice
president of the Union Oil Company of California, has been a resident of Los
Angeles since 1901. He is a native of
Dodge County, Minnesota, born February 14, 1869. His father, John Hall Orcutt, was descended
from Pilgrim and old Virginia stock, having five ancestors who arrived in
America on the Mayflower: Francis Cooke,
John Howland (secretary to Governor Carver), John Howland’s wife, Miss Tilley,
and her parents. Through his
great-grandmother, Nancy Butler, he was related to the Washington and Lee
families of Virginia. He was also of
royal descent through his ancestor, James Leonard, brother of Lord Dacre. He served as
a soldier in the Civil War and against the Sioux Indians. He married Adeline Warren, a descendant of
the famous Warren and Curtis families of New England, who traced her line in direct
descent from William the Conqueror through the marriage of her ancestor,
William de Warrenne, to Gundred,
the daughter of the king. The Orcutt
family came to California in 1881, and John H. Orcutt spent many years as a
horticulturist at Santa Paula in Ventura County.
W. W. Orcutt attended public schools
in Santa Paula, the Santa Paula Academy, and in 1891 entered Stanford
University, being one of the first students enrolled on the opening day of that
institution. Mr. Orcutt graduated with
the pioneer class of 1895, receiving the A. B. degree. While in college he specialized in geology
and engineering, being fellow member in these classes with Herbert Hoover,
later President of the United States.
Mr. Orcutt’s life work was to be in these two
fields. On leaving the university he was
located for a time at Santa Paula as a civil and hydraulic engineer, and as
United States deputy surveyor until May, 1898.
He then became superintendent of the San Joaquin Valley division of the
Union Oil Company of California, and his service with that great corporation
has been continuous for more than thirty-five years. He now (1933) is, in point of service, the
oldest employee in the organization. In
1901 he became geologist and engineer for the Union Oil Company, with
headquarters in Los Angeles, and subsequently was made manager of the
geological, land and engineering departments.
He is now active head of these departments, with the office of vice
president. Since 1908 he has been a
director and member of the executive committee of the company.
In the early years of the petroleum
industry the employment of expert geologists was seldom practiced by even the
larger oil companies. It was the
successful work done by Mr. Orcutt in applying scientific principles for
solving the problems of oil development that brought the expert geologist into
high favor with oil companies in the west, and the Union Oil Company of
California was the first on the coast to organize a geological department for
research work and the discovery of new oil fields. Mr. Orcutt made the first geological maps of
Coalinga, Lompoc and the Santa Maria oil fields, and was employed in the
selection and purchase of properties for the Union Oil Company in those
districts. It was in appreciation of the
value of this service that the town of Orcutt in Santa Barbara County was named
for him. Orcutt, Colorado, likewise
bears his name in tribute to his work in petroleum geology.
Mr. Orcutt has held a number of
important executive positions in business organizations, having been president
of the Newlove Oil Company, of the Bedrock Oil
Company, the Lakeview Oil Company and of the Brea Townsite
Company. He is now president of the La
Merced Heights Land & Water Company, Canoga Citrus Association, and vice
president of the Midway Royal Petroleum Company, of the Standard Plaster
Company, Outer Harbor Dock & Wharf Company, Los Angeles Oil Company and
Syndicate Oil Company. He is also a director
in the Security-First National Bank of Los Angeles, Fort Collins Producing
Company, St. Helens Petroleum Company, Ltd., Kern River Oilfields of
California, Ltd., Community Mutual Water Company and Southwestern Ore Company.
In connection with his geological
work Mr. Orcutt, in 1901, made the original discovery of the famous La Brea
fossil beds in the western limits of the city of Los Angeles, and in 1906
brought these discoveries to the attention of the department of paleontology of
the University of California. Since then
from these beds have been taken the most remarkable prehistoric animal remains
in the world. From them complete specimens of the sabre-tooth tiger, Imperial
elephant, giant ground sloth, mastodon and many other extinct species have been
secured for the great museums of the world.
Several hitherto unknown species of these fossils bear the name,
“Orcutt,” in recognition of this discovery.
Mr. Orcutt is the owner of several
ranches, and has given his personal supervision to making them productive of
the varied California crops. He is also
greatly interested in livestock, having been a director of the Southern
California Purebred Livestock Association and was the owner of a herd of
registered Herefords which he had developed to about four hundred head when he
sold them. He also has large individual
mining interests. He is a member of the
American Society of Civil Engineers, the Southern California Academy of
Sciences, Seismological Society of America, Society of the Sons of the
Revolution, Americans of Royal Descent, Descendants of Knights of the Garter,
and a member of the board of regents of the Pacific Geographic Society, of
which he was the first president.
Because of his great contributions to petroleum geology, Mr. Orcutt was
accorded the rare distinction of honorary membership in the American
Association of Petroleum Geologists, being one of two honorary members of this organization. He is also a member of the Los Angeles
Country Club, Los Angeles Athletic Club, University Club, Pacific Coast Club,
Hollywood Athletic Club, Surf and Sand Club and Santa Monica Athletic Club. He is a Democrat in politics, is a member of
the Presbyterian Church and fraternally is affiliated with the Masons. Mr. Orcutt is an outdoorsman and an ardent
sportsman, being interested in both hunting and fishing. One of his large ranches is devoted to
raising deer for sport. In his college
days he was a noted athlete, playing football on the Varsity Eleven when Walter
Camp was coach, and was a member of the famous Stanford football team of which
Herbert Hoover was business manager. He
was awarded the coveted “Block S” in 1895 for track and football.
On June 9, 1897, Mr. Orcutt and Miss
Mary Logan were married at Santa Paula, California. Mrs. Orcutt was born in Tyrone, Pennsylvania,
daughter of Doctor Marshall Livingston and Anna (Rainey) Logan. Mrs. Orcutt is also of royal descent,
belonging to that branch of the Logan family which is noted in the annals of
this country as well as of Great Britain and which was allied by marriage with
the royal family of Scotland. Through
this marriage of her ancestor with the daughter of Robert II, Mrs. Orcutt’s descent is from Charlemagne, the Louis’s of
France, Alfred the Great and St. Olaf of Norway. Her father, Doctor Logan, served in the Civil
War as a member of the Twenty-second Cavalry of Pennsylvania Volunteers and
sustained wounds in battle from the effect of which he died at the untimely age
of forty. He was one of the most
distinguished dental surgeons of his day, a pioneer in corrective dentistry,
and made the first tooth crown in the world, the “Logan crown.” He was greatly beloved by his
fellow-townsmen, and in his honor, the street in Tyrone, where he lived, bears
his name.
Mrs. Orcutt was educated in the
schools of Tyrone, Pennsylvania, in the Santa Paula Academy in California, and
Pomona College at Claremont. She has
served as a member of the Los Angeles district board of the California
Federation of Women’s Clubs, was chairman in 1911 of the committee on
resolutions of the California Federation of Women’s Clubs,
when woman suffrage was endorsed, and was largely responsible in its adoption;
was a member in 1911 of the Los Angeles County Milk Commission, which certified
milk for Los Angeles County; and in 1912-13 was a member of the executive
committee of the Committee of One Thousand of Los Angeles, which prepared the charter
for the city of Los Angeles. Mrs. Orcutt
is a life member of the Ebell of Los Angeles, which she joined in 1902 and was
a member of its executive board for five years.
She was a charter member of the Woman’s City Club, charter member of the
Los Angeles Society of Social Hygiene and of the Psychopathic Parole Society,
and now is a charter member of the Woman’s Athletic Club. She has been a director of the Friday Morning
Club and of the Woman’s University Club, which latter club she served as vice
president during the World War. Being
greatly interested in civic beautification, Mrs. Orcutt is vice president of
the Women’s Community Service Auxiliary of the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce,
and chairman of its civic beautification committee. She is a member of the Presbyterian Church.
Mr. and Mrs. Orcutt have two children. The daughter, Gertrude Logan Orcutt Guasti,
is a graduate of Stanford University with the class of 1921, and was a member
of the Kappa Kappa Gamma sorority. She married in 1923 Secondo Guasti, Jr., and
they are the parents of two sons, Secondo Guasti, III, and William Orcutt
Guasti. The son, John Logan Orcutt,
attended the agricultural branch of the University of California at Davis,
making agriculture and horticulture his profession, in which he has gained a
notable success. In 1931 he married Miss
Alice Pedersen of San Francisco and Hollister.
William Warren Orcutt and Mrs. Orcutt have been residents of Los Angeles
since 1901, their present city home being at 403 South Mariposa Avenue. They also maintain a country residence at
Rancho Sombra del Roble in
San Fernando Valley.
Transcribed
by V. Gerald Iaquinta.
Source: California of the South
Vol. IV, by John Steven McGroarty, Pages 795-800,
Clarke Publ., Chicago, Los Angeles, Indianapolis. 1933.
© 2012 V.
Gerald Iaquinta.
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BIOGRAPHIES